Not So Swift Boats [with comment by Paul]

About this business of the navy patrol boats captured by Iran. As Scott and Investors Business Daily point out, there’s something off about the official story that a “navigation error” caused the boats to stray into Iranian waters. I don’t believe this story for a moment. (And the initial explanation that the boats “drifted” there after engine trouble has already been withdrawn. Why was that put out or not disavowed immediately?) One hopes that boat crews would navigate by means in addition to GPS since GPS could be taken out in a serious conflict, but unless our sailors have become incompetent or there was some extraordinary failure on these boats (unlikely I think), this “navigation error” sounds like either a deliberate mission that the Pentagon can’t acknowledge*, or the Iranians captured the boats in international waters, and we’re not willing to dispute their claim because of the Iran arms treaty agreement.

My conclusion: we’re being lied to by the Obama Administration (I know—shocker). By coincidence, the other day I ran across a quotation from Eleanor Roosevelt from back in 1948, when American liberals were starting to come to grips with the fact that the Soviet Union was being run by a bunch of gangsters. ER criticized American concessions to the Soviets as follows: “Instead of looking at it as a gesture of good will, they look at it as a gesture of weakness.” I suspect Iran understands this just as easily.

You know things are bad when Eleanor Roosevelt can be held up as a model of clear-minded toughness compared to today’s liberals. Yes—Eleanor Roosevelt better than John Kerry. The only thing swift about Kerry is the boat he once scratched his finger on. (“Purple heart? No, no—I meant ‘purple haze!’”)

* Another odd detail in some news reports is that that boats “lost communication” with the rest of the fleet in the area. Both boats? No backup radios?

Why are we running those kind of boats in the Persian Gulf anyway? I’m no expert in navy force configurations, but those boats look like the kind you might use to infiltrate some special forces into Iran. Hmmm. (Just how do you pronounce “Tonkin Gulf” in Arabic?)

PAUL adds: This story broke on Tuesday. That evening, at a special Washington, D.C. showing of the movie “13 Hours,” several high-ranking former military men expressed deep skepticism about the official story that was emerging in regard to the two boats.